


Locked Away

by MistBorn_SprenDeath



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Gen, If you sing loud enough you can't hear the liars, Memories, Music, Older Sibling Wilbur Soot, Poetry, Stay on your half of the room and I'll stay on mine, Tommy has a memory of Wilbur
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:20:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29642223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistBorn_SprenDeath/pseuds/MistBorn_SprenDeath
Summary: “Don’t cross the line.” Tommy growled, pressing against the obsidian, as close to the lava as he could be without swimming in it.Dream held up his hands in surrender, stepping back away from the netherite line in the floor. “You’re not going to be able to ignore me for an entire week, Tommy.” Dream hummed, sounding amused.Tommy’s first instinct was to curse at the man, but that would mean acknowledging the maniac.What was he supposed to do?How was he supposed to block out his panic *and* Dream?(He wasn’t so sure that those were two different things)
Relationships: Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit
Comments: 4
Kudos: 183





	1. Humming

“Don’t cross the line.” Tommy growled, pressing against the obsidian, as close to the lava as he could be without swimming in it.

Dream held up his hands in surrender, stepping back away from the netherite line in the floor.

Tommy wished the netherite barrier was raised, even if it meant that his chest would collapse further. Closing his eyes, Tommy placed his head between his knees, trying to focus on breathing. He’d rather be anywhere else, literally _anywhere_ else. Just anywhere that _Dream_ wasn’t.

“You’re not going to be able to ignore me for an entire _week_ , Tommy.” Dream hummed, sounding amused.

Tommy’s first instinct was to curse at the man, but that would mean acknowledging the maniac.

What was he _supposed_ to do?

How was he supposed to block out his panic _and_ Dream?

(He wasn’t so sure that those were two different things)

A memory came back to Tommy in that moment. One about Wilbur. Alivebur. His older brother. Back when he was happy and kind.

Tommy had woken up in the middle of the night because of a silly nightmare. The panic in his chest had been so intense he thought he was going to _die_. But then he heard Wilbur playing his guitar, the sound only slightly muffled by the thin walls of the house.

Wrapped up in his blanket as tight as he could be, Tommy had quietly crept down the hall to Wilbur’s room. He wasn’t about to open the door, then Wilbur would know he was awake, and he’d have to tell him about the nightmare he had. So he sat down beside the door as quietly as he could, and listened to Wilbur playing.

It was a new song that Tommy actually had never heard before.

(Wilbur must have started writing the song that night. Did that mean Wilbur couldn’t sleep either?)

With the light peering from under his brother’s door and the sound of his brother singing, Tommy fell back asleep before he even realized it.

He woke up with a start and a sharp ache in his neck.

Wilbur had cracked his door open, which is what had startled him back awake.

“Toms?”

Tommy moved away from the door quickly, pulling his blanket closer.

“Why are you sleeping on my door?”

He felt his cheeks burn warm with embarrassment.

Wilbur sighed at his stubborn silence. “Don’t just sit there on the floor.” Opening the door wider, Wilbur waited for Tommy to enter before closing the door behind him. “I was just working on a new song.”

Nodding silently, Tommy sat on Wilbur’s bed, clutching his knees to his chest.

Instead of prying for an answer or forcing Tommy to talk, Wilbur had played the song for him, stumbling over the chords several times but still determined to figure the song out.

After Wilbur played it through, he started another song, one that Tommy _was_ familiar with and could hum along to.

Cycling through several songs with ease, Wilbur’s voice seemed to fill the air with warmth, replacing the panic that Tommy had been feeling.

He felt warm and safe.

Wilbur brought the song he was playing to a finish and hesitated for a moment, looking up from his guitar to Tommy. “You know how sometimes I feel really sad, Toms?”

Tommy had nodded at the time. He didn’t really understand depression at that point.

“Well, when I’m feeling really overwhelmed, I like to play my music or sing a song. It helps.” Wilbur gave him a small smile,one of the ones that he only gave when he was feeling down. “Music is a magic of its own.”

Looking back, Tommy could see what Wilbur had been trying to say.

Head still in-between his knees, Tommy racked his brain for a song that he could sing. It really wasn’t any surprise to him that it was one of Wilbur’s songs that came to mind. His voice wasn’t nearly as good as Wilbur’s, but he knew all the words.

Cycling through song after song, Tommy began to realize just how much of Wilbur’s music he knew. He hadn’t realized just how many of the songs he had memorized every word for. Each song a painful reminder of his brother. The brother he no longer had.

Not even Ghostbur could replace Wilbur. He wasn’t the _same_. He was a shard of a soul. It made his chest ache and burn at the thought of his brother no longer making music. Ghostbur didn’t have the same passion for music that Wilbur did.

But it also made Tommy feel closer to Wilbur than he had ever been. A sort of understanding.

When Dream tried to talk to him he’d just have to sing over the man. His throat was dry and scratched by an hour in, but anything that could drown out his thoughts _and_ Dream was golden in his book.

If he had to start looping through the same songs, that wasn’t his problem.

(It was Dream’s annoyance which made it 100% worth it)

Eventually though, he pulled out the book that Dream had given him, and began to write his _own_ songs.

They were nothing like Wilbur’s songs, they weren’t even necessarily _good_ songs, but Tommy had never felt closer to his dead brother.


	2. Poetry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy dabbles in Poetry

Tommy wasn’t one for poetry. That was something more within the realms of Wilbur’s _stuff_.Wilbur was the brother that wrote songs and clever little stories. That was _Wilbur’s_ thing.

> _A button, so small_
> 
> _The truest king of them all_

But sometimes he felt poetic.

> _First came the sword_
> 
> _Second came the arrow_
> 
> _And finally came the fist_

Not in the same way as his brother Wilbur. No, _Wilbur_ knew his way around words and knew how to make them paint the picture that he wanted you to see. Wilbur was an artist.

> _Living is existing_
> 
> _Living is being_
> 
> _Death is nothing_
> 
> _Death is losing_

Tommy was just a bit melodramatic.

> _The red glow of liquid sorrow_
> 
> _Beckons me on, to the morrow_
> 
> _I don’t know her name_
> 
> _Nor her impossible game_
> 
> _But her ashen black veil_
> 
> _Must be death’s very sail_

He thought he deserved to be a bit _upset_ to say the least.

> _Mask of Deception_
> 
> _Mask of Destruction_
> 
> _Mask of Porcelain_
> 
> _Mask of Boar Bone_

Losing all three of his lives to the _same_ tyrant, and being _trapped_ with him.

> _Sunsets and Regrets_
> 
> _I wish I could Forget_
> 
> _The beginning and the end_
> 
> _I wish I never knew you were my friend_

Maybe he even deserved to feel angry.

> _Inkling regrets_
> 
> _Ink won’t forget_
> 
> _Who I’ve become_
> 
> _And what I have done_

That’s what he felt.

> _I remember we once built a dream of a city_
> 
> _Wasted on a dream I’m never gonna see_

Bitter.

> _You’re falling a part like a cookie crumbles_
> 
> _Don’t blame me when you can’t stand the rumble._

Angry.

> _Fall like ashes to the ground_
> 
> _Promise, no one will hear a sound._

Hurt.

> _Blind as a bat and stinking like a mole_
> 
> _It’s not their fault you can’t handle the role._
> 
> _The role you were made to play_
> 
> _The role assigned on your very first day_

Alone.

> _Ship sinking while you’re_
> 
> _running like a rat_
> 
> _You always go feral_
> 
> _When the monster bites back_

So maybe he understood why Wilbur wrote his songs and lyrics.

> _Broken like glass in the grinder_
> 
> _If I were you, I’d mind my manners_

Tommy rather liked to rhyme, but he wasn’t sure that he was always successful.

> _Preaching your fantasy to an invisible choir_
> 
> _And you still act surprised when it’s all caught fire._

His poems didn’t have any secret messages or hidden meanings.

> _Demoralized and alone_
> 
> _This is not your home._

That was _Wilbur_ ’s thing. Not his.

> _I’ll tear you to the ground_
> 
> _before you even make a sound_
> 
> _I know what makes your clock tick_
> 
> _know how to make your mind sick_

Not the Wilbur that had been there in the void, taunting and worse than he was before his death.

> _I could show you my scars, open my heart_
> 
> _But what would you say? What would you see?_
> 
> _I hope a masterpiece, a work of art_
> 
> _But I wouldn’t blame you if I revealed the monster in me_
> 
> _And you ran_

That wasn’t his Wilbur. His brother.

> _I am small in this world,_
> 
> _insignificant and scared_
> 
> _Scared of who I used to be_
> 
> _Scared of this me_
> 
> _Scared of the future me to come_
> 
> _Lost in my sorrow for the_
> 
> _Broken todays_
> 
> _And the Ruined tomorrows_
> 
> _I thought I was doing okay_
> 
> _But my demons followed_

No, his brother Wilbur was amazing and _kind_ and so incredibly smart, always managing to talk his way out of _anything_.

> _Building Mercy in Ashes_
> 
> _Burning Lines on Sand_

But whoever that _man_ was, he wasn’t Tommy’s Wilbur.

> _I don’t make any sense_
> 
> _No recompense_
> 
> _I don’t have smooth cues_
> 
> _What’s that to you?_

Tommy refused to believe that the same man who had practically _raised_ him was the mad man trapped within the void.

> _Seeing prophecy in the clouds_
> 
> _Seeing figures in the ashes_
> 
> _A monster’s future in shrouds_
> 
> _Built of a weak soul’s lashes_

That man could _never_ come back to life. Tommy wouldn’t wish that on his worst enemies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hadn't planned on adding anything more to this, and yet here we are.
> 
> All of these poems are mine - so, no sources here except for my own brain. They're wonky and kind of cringy, but I thought it'd fit well with Tommy's experience. 
> 
> Kind of capitalizing on the Big Brother Wilbur angst, so there's that for you guys! :D 
> 
> <3 Stay safe, hydrate! Thank you so much for reading.


End file.
